Since my last update I have made a little headway with my Poe challenge, there has been zero activity in my Comic Companions challenge, because I haven’t finished any reads, and I have decided to try something a little different when choosing new books over the next two months 😀

But firstly:

Last Sunday I read four more stories: A Premature Burial(which is about a man who suffers from catalypsy and so has a deep-seated fear that he will be mistaken for dead when having an episode and buried alive), The Assignation(a confusing story which starts with a child being saved from drowning, and ends with his mother and rescuer both dying mysteriously from poison, and maybe they were lovers? This one may have made the least sense out of the whole collection), Shadow – a Parable(a very short story about a group of men in Ancient Greece or Rome I believe, who perform a ritual resembling a séance), and lastly The Black Cat(which describes some pretty shocking abuse of a pet cat by his master who is subsequently led to madness and murder from his guilt and perceived taunts of a replacement cat. I was a bit rattled by this one, but it was a chilling and well-written little story).

As I said a couple of updates back, my challenge is now going til the 15th of June (1 year, 1 month, and 1 day since I started Tales of Mystery and Imagination) so I have the rest of this week, and next week until Saturday to read the last 6 stories.

As I said above, there has been no action on the Comic Companions front as I haven’t finished any books this week – BUT! – I did receive a graphic novel that I ordered in the mail:

Too bad its the third volume and the second is yet to arrive, otherwise I probably would start it as soon as I finished one of my reads (probably City of Ghostsby Stacia Kane since I have been hooked on that since I started it and will likely finish this weekend, if not today), but I do still have lots to choose from until volume 2 shows up 🙂

In other news, the other day (which if you know me can mean anywhere from yesterday to a month ago – there, now I’ve shared that with you, you do know me! Welcome to my mind! Have a cup of tea and make yourself at home 🙂 ) I read a post on a blog I recently followed, The Perks of Being a Bookworm, which shared a really cool idea she found on tumblr:

Basically you write books from you TBR pile on bits of paper, stick it in a jar and then fish one out when you want a new read! The creator, Crini from the tumblr page All About Books, used different coloured strips of paper for different genres (Fantasy, SciFi, Contemporary, Thriller/Horror) so she would still have a little bit of choice in the kind of book she wanted to read.

I love this idea and wanted to try it out for a little while – taking a break from my usual process of choosing – but instead I have done different colours for my different TBR piles:

Green are Graphic Novels (my own and ones I’ve borrowed from libraries or friends)

and Purple are my own Books-I’ve-Bought-But-Have-Yet-To-Read pile

That way I can still keep a modicum of my old ritual by choosing a book from the pile that I just finished one from, while also mixing up my habits a tad 🙂

I thought I would try the jar thing for June and July, because that will give me enough time to trial it (I wouldn’t want to do it for a period when I only choose one or two new reads) but not too long that I will miss my little ritual. And also doing it for June/July allows me to make this a thing:

Which is just an excuse for me to play in Photoshop again 🙂

Anyway, that’s it from me for now. In my next update there will probably be some Comic Companions news to share, as well as my continuing slog through Tales of Mystery and Imagination, and the results of my fledgling Jar O’ Books choosing (or choosings – who knows)